


The Latecomer

by Hello_Spikey



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-01
Updated: 2013-05-01
Packaged: 2019-10-11 03:50:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17439401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hello_Spikey/pseuds/Hello_Spikey
Summary: Post-NFA, Spike shows up at the Council's castle in Scotland, and Rupert is the one to answer the door.





	The Latecomer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sueworld2003](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=sueworld2003).



> Sueworld challenged me to Spike/Giles, something to go with a naughty image — alas, no longer available.
> 
> I decided to go post-NFA, pre-comics (with a few of my own personal 'it's better if' changes to comics canon).
> 
> This turned out oddly not-rapey for me. Kind of sweet and H/C, without much H. I don't know who I am or what happened to the real Hello-Spikey...

Giles was not in the habit of answering the door. In fact, when one lived with over a hundred young women eagerly anticipating the arrival of their beaus, one did not get much opportunity to answer the door. But perhaps there was a vitally important episode of a reality show on that night, or one of the many inter-personal wars had broken out, driving the slayers to their rooms with locked doors. Whatever the reason, when the knock came, Giles found himself alone in the hall asking, “Does anyone else want to get that?”

Hearing no response he sighed, set his book on a side-table, and made the long trek down the main staircase, the bangs coming louder now and wafting up the great empty echo-chamber of the front hall. “Yes, yes, I’m coming, damn it.”

Slightly out of breath, he pulled back the heavy front door, and then the rest of the breath inside him left as he faced a ghost.

Soaked from rain, Spike leaned against the stone column that flanked the doorway. “You still have to invite me in, Rupert.”

“You’re dead,” Giles said.

“Yes,” Spike responded, slowly. “That’s why you have to invite me in.” He was leaning heavily on his forearm, Giles now saw, and had a particularly bloodless look about him that couldn’t have been just due to the rain.

Giles wanted to gather him up and get him to a warm fire immediately, but illusions were of necessity compelling. “How do I know you are really Spike?”

“Oh for fuck’s sake!” Spike rolled his eyes, raised two fingers, and then passed out.

Spike was crumpled on his side. His feet were bare, long exposed ankles vulnerable in the rain. Giles supposed only the genuine Spike would use up the last of his strength to flip off the one person who could help him. He still poked the body with an umbrella to ensure its solidity before crossing the threshold himself.

Spike was very cold, like meat taken from the fridge. Like a cadaver. Giles carried him to the nearest surface – the sofa in the receiving parlor, and immediately started pulling the soaking wet clothing off of him.

He looked up to see Xander had come to see what the commotion was. “Get a fire started,” Giles told him. “And find a bathrobe or something we can put him in.”

“Is that…” Xander craned his neck.

“Just hurry.”

Xander nodded and left. Be right a hundred or more times, Giles mused, and people start to listen to you.

He looked down at Spike, now stripped bare enough that he could see the long cuts on his torso, the ragged, untreated wounds he’d hidden under his jeans. He knew vampires couldn’t get hypothermia, but it didn’t stop him from wanting quite desperately to create warmth.

Xander returned with some bath towels and a plaid robe that was almost certainly Xander’s own. Giles thanked him and set to work drying Spike off while Xander stacked kindling and logs in the fireplace.

“Is he…” Xander kept his eyes on his work and coughed. “Is Spike, like, alive? Willow was saying there was some kind of prophecy about a vampire with a soul… something Angel found.”

“No, he’s not alive.” Giles pressed his fingers to the silent pulse-point at Spike’s neck, but he needn’t have bothered. Spike was still as the grave when he really lost consciousness. It was how he could always tell when the wanker was pretending to be asleep. “We’ll need blood.”

“Uh… I could ask Kay in the infirmary.”

“No, don’t use her supplies. We’ll just…” Giles blinked, mind blank. It had been so easy to find blood in Sunnydale. Why had it seemed so effortless to take in vampires?

“I’m on it, G-man.” Xander grasped Giles’ shoulder before leaving.

Giles felt a vague wish that he’d argue with him about all this, because he wasn’t sure he was doing the right thing. “You’ve grown soft,” he chided himself, and went to get bandages to cover Spike’s wounds.

***

Spike’s dreams were grey and full of rain. They always were, these days. Cold rain and exhaustion and struggle and how much work it was, going out in a blaze of glory this time. Except he didn’t go out. Again. Fate just seemed to love sticking him back in it, back to slogging one foot in front of another. His dream ended with walking, barefoot, picking softer spots between a gravel-spotted road and brambles. One foot in front of the other.

He gasped, waking. It was a shock to the system, the soft comforter over him, the play of firelight on cross-beams.

Laser-like, the scent of blood hit his nostrils. He struggled to sit up. The comforter felt like it was made of lead.

“Easy,” said a familiar voice. A warm hand reached behind his shoulders, steadying him. He looked up to see Giles in a denim shirt, sleeves rolled up, holding a sports bottle that smelled absolutely heavenly.

“Where the buggering hell am I?”

“My bed. Don’t read anything into that.”

Spike chuckled. “Why Rupert, you old dog.”

“Just drink.”

You didn’t need to tell Spike twice. He found strength he didn’t know he had left and grabbed the bottle with both hands. The warm blood gushed into his mouth and he shivered with pleasure. All too soon it was gone and he was pulling the lid off so he could lick the inside of the bottle.

Giles grunted, “Could you please try not to sound quite so… orgasmic? And calm down, there’s another bottle.”

“Rupert, you know just what to say to get to a boy’s heart.” He dropped the empty bottle and grabbed the one Giles proffered, moaning in exaggerated bliss now that he had the self-control to do so.

“I gather it’s been a while since you’ve eaten. You can thank Xander for the blood. I don’t know where he got it, but there are two more after that.”

Spike paused in drinking long enough to say, “Xander got this? Way to ruin the moment.”

“I should think you’d be grateful he wasn’t trying to stake you, instead.”

Spike almost choked on blood from laughing. He stopped, finished the bottle, and sighed, leaning back. “I had plenty of time on the journey to imagine what my welcome would be like. Have to say none of my scenarios were this nice.”

It was Giles’ turn to sigh. “You’re welcome. And thank you for saving the bloody world.”

Spike knew he must be grinning like an idiot because Giles sighed again and said, “What?”

“Nothing. Just I think that’s the first thanks I’ve gotten for it. Feels lovely, hearing it.”

“Are you done?” Another sigh. “With the blood. I know you’re not done being insufferable.”

Spike shrugged and looked down into the empty bottle. “Might need one more, just to fill in the corners.”

Giles obligingly plucked the empty from his hands and replaced it with another warm, full bottle. “Where you aware you had no shoes on?”

“Yeah. Traded the docs for passage on a ship. They were so worn out –can’t believe anyone would want them, but there’s a nostalgia market or something.”

Giles gave him a hard look. “How far exactly where you walking barefoot?”

“Aw, you care! Just the nearest seaport. The boots got me here from London.” Spike tucked his chin and batted his eyelashes. “Can’t tell you what I traded for the trip across the Atlantic.”

“Something less dramatic or offensive than I can think of or you’d be telling me.” Giles lifted the blanket, checking Spike’s side.

Spike could feel the warmth of his fingertips through the thin bandage. On flesh itching with healing it felt electric and erotic. He bit his lip to stop a moan, and then coughed when that didn’t work. Giles was moving closer and closer to finding more than he bargained for. “Uh… drinking fresh blood for the first time in weeks has an effect on a vampire.”

Giles glanced up at him. “You mean you get hard? I’m not eight, Spike.”

Spike’s dick stood to attention and squeezed out a drop in salute to Giles’ authoritative voice. His throat was suddenly dry. “No… and you’re not eighty, either.”

Their eyes were on a level, now, and not far apart. The air felt heavy, suddenly. “Meaning what?” Giles asked.

“Meaning that if you get any closer to my todger you’ll find yourself pinned to the bed.”

Giles looked – amused? Flattered? He set his free hand down on the other side of Spike’s hip and leaned over him, close enough that their noses almost touched. “I’m more accustomed to doing the pinning.”

“Fuck. You’re killing me.”

Giles smirked. “Hardly,” he said, and then, cruelly, stood. “You seem to be making a full recovery. There are some clothes for you on the chair when you’re ready to get up.”

“You’re not leaving me like this! Bloody sadist!”

Giles gave him a look that promised all kinds of wonderful interpretations of the word ‘sadist’, and then just walked out the door, proving he was one, indeed.

Spike groaned and punched the mattress, knowing that if he hadn’t had the soul, he wouldn’t be thinking twice about jerking off right then.

Stupid soul and its concern for other people, possibly young slayers, cleaning up. He was finally not in pain, not cold and wet, and he was in hell.

***

The reunion went as well as could be expected. There were stilted silences as Spike related the last days of Angel’s crew in LA to the assembled slayers and watchers. Giles supposed it was a mercy Buffy and Faith were in Cleveland, battling a water demon that was feeding on fishermen in Lake Erie. These girls had never met Spike without a soul, they didn’t have the conflicted feelings Giles felt reflected in Xander and Willow’s eyes.

Spike expressed his desire to be useful to the team, killing monsters or training new slayers. He was humble and self-deprecating and Giles caught more than one pair of mooning eyes eating it all up. He amended his list of fortunate absences to include Andrew.

“Why did you come here, of all places?” Giles asked.

Spike blinked. “Like I said – no one’s left in LA. Not enough of a fight to keep me there on my lonesome.”

“Cleveland would have been a significantly shorter trip.”

Spike shrugged. His gaze lingered on Giles. “You reach an age where you just want to be near people who already know you.”

Giles had to quickly look away. Fortunately, Xander brought up the subject of where Spike would be staying and that resulted in the empty, pointless bickering all room assignments created.

But when he looked up again, Spike was still looking at him. Giles excused himself and left.

***

For several days, Giles avoided Spike as he settled in to life at the castle. It seemed that Spike wasn’t seeking out contact, either, and so Giles assumed that his overly-forward behavior on his first night in the castle was forgiven and forgotten.

Until he came back to his room after a late meeting to find Spike sprawled across the bedcovers in nothing but a collar and a silver cock-cage.

Giles was still staring in frank shock when Spike rolled onto his side and said, “Oh thank Christ. That was bloody ages I’ve been waiting.”

“What the hell are you wearing?”

Spike dipped his shoulder. “Just a few things I found in your closet. Thought I’d start with the tamer stuff.”

All the blood left Giles’ head as he recalled the box of very old, very secret keepsakes of his time as Ethan’s flat-mate. “Why you… you filthy bastard!”

Spike’s response was a broad grin. “Going to punish me, daddy?”

“You’ve violated my privacy!”

Spike oozed off the bed. “So violate mine.”

Giles slapped his hands away. “This is serious.”

“You’re telling me.” Spike wriggled around Giles’ attempts at deflecting him and got his arms draped over Giles’ shoulders. “I’ve got the bluest balls since Celibacy Smurf. Locked up in this castle full of exceptionally horny young women I don’t dare even look at – and _you_.” Spike rubbed Giles’ clothed leg with his bare one. “All commanding lord of the manor, playing nigh-impossible-to-get.”

With all that flawless naked flesh pressed against him, Giles was having a hard time remembering why he was angry. And god, did he have a kink for being clothed while his partner was naked. He found himself stroking the long, lithe sides, gripping hips that fit his hands perfectly and pressing them against his own. All terribly wrong and he’d stop at any time.

With a huskier voice than he intended, Giles said, “This is wrong and you know it. You’re emotionally vulnerable.”

“I’m over eighteen, mate.”

“And grieving. And lonely enough to latch onto a man who once tried to kill you.”

Spike’s nose brushed up the side of Giles’ neck. “Dating tip? Best not to bring that up. And don’t think I haven’t noticed your hands are still on my arse.”

A shudder went through Giles. He wasn’t sure if he was fighting his urges or giving in to them. “What happens when Buffy comes home?”

Giles felt the chuckle against his chest. “I wasn’t going to bring it up before supper. C’mon, Rupert… who here isn’t damaged goods?”

Spike pulled back then, leaning his weight against Giles’ hands, and there was something painfully vulnerable in his expression, like he would shatter to pieces if refused.

Giles dug his fingers in hard. “Shut up and get on the bed.”

Like a light switching on, Spike’s expression blossomed into a grin. “Sir, yes sir!”

“Disobeying already? This is going to be a long night.”

Spike stumbled backward over the end of the bed in his eagerness. “God I hope so,” he said, then turned his back, crawling up on all fours.

Giles hissed in appreciation at the view and decided that yes, it was going to be a very long night indeed.


End file.
